Right to Education and No Hate Speech
By promoting the campaign “RIGHT TO EDUCATION and NO HATE SPEECH”, ENGO MVI wanted to celebrate its 4th anniversary (19th November 2012). For 4 years we have contributed to the development of society and its members by various methods of education.
The mission of this campaign was to sensitize society about education and embrace the right for everyone to receive an education, as well as about speech that attacks a person or groups on the basis of attributes such as gender, ethnic origin, religion, race, disability, or sexual orientation.
These are two big problems of our society that affect every person, more or less. With this campaign we hoped to inform and create the idea that we are all equal and have the same rights.
It is the responsibility of countries to guarantee each child’s right to an education. They must focus their efforts on primary education so as to make schools accessible and free for all children and thus enable them to learn to read and write.
Besides, we can’t forget about non formal education that has a large influence on childrens’ lives.
Education, both formal and non formal, supports young people in pursuing their interests and main objectives. Non-formal education gives young people the possibility to develop values, skills and competencies in a complementary fashion to formal education methods and setups.
Those skills (also called ‘soft skills’) include a wide range of competencies such as interpersonal, team, organizational and conflict management, intercultural awareness, leadership, planning, organizing, co-ordination and practical problem solving skills, teamwork, self-confidence, discipline and responsibility.
What is peculiar about non-formal education is that individuals, participants are the actors involved in the education/learning process, rather than mere recipients. To help young people take advantage of non-formal education activities, NGOs and other institutions develop and perfection projects and initiatives based on non formal methods of education, wherein each category of target is enable to choose the topic(s) of greatest interest to them.
The second prong of MV International 2016 Social Campaign is provided by the theme of No Hate Speech values. Hate speech was always the first weapon of attack on new emigrants, on people on the basis of attributes such as ethnic origin, religion, race, gender, disability, or, sexual orientation and has the potential result of inciting harm.
Just about anyone can be a target of hate speech. Some people might become targets due to their beloging to a particular race, nationality, or religion. Other people could be targeted because they are disabled in some way, or because of their gender, age, or sexual orientation.
To avoid conflicts of this kind and to sensitize and inform society with reference to the disastrous and negative sides of these actions, commemorative actions are often organized.
One of these is European Action Day of Victims of Hate Crime that takes place in on 22 July-the day of Oslo attacks and Utøya massacre that claimed a total of 77 lives. Each year, the No Hate Speech Movement through its campaigners, activists and partner organizations commemorates and expresses solidarity with the victims of hate crime.
States are responsible to investigate and unmask the motivation behind hate crimes under Article 14 of the European Convention of Human Rights as it affects the entire society.
After reading/understanding the idea/objectives of the campaign, participants followed the next steps, filling in requested information and submitting their suggestions to ENGO MVI, to the e-mail address: secretary@mvinternational.info.
video: NO HATE SPEECH (approx. 3 min) – participants recorded a video in which they chose an issue of Hate Speech that their community (or Europe) was confronting with and tried to identify a solution that could be an opportunity for cooperation and tolerance in society.
Photograph: the participants created a photograph related to the Right to Education. Photographs were collected by MVI and formed part of the Campaign. Both Videos appeared on the website of ENGO MVI.
This is the summary video of the campaign: